


A Vow in My Turn

by darklittlestories



Category: Norse Religion & Lore, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types, Thor (Movies)
Genre: Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie) Spoilers, Canon-Typical Violence, Fix-It, Loki (Marvel)-centric, M/M, Magic, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Post-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Quests, References to Norse Religion & Lore, Sibling Incest, Slow Burn, for a while, hang in there, somewhat graphic description of death
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-05-14
Updated: 2018-06-08
Packaged: 2019-05-06 08:42:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,084
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14638227
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/darklittlestories/pseuds/darklittlestories
Summary: The Æsir know much of the afterlife, but even their knowledge cannot be complete, for something so mysterious can never be known fully.And so in the strange time after his death, Loki finds himself in a situation new even for him, confronting the consequences of the vows he’d made in the moments before dying—and embarking on a quest. The paths may be winding but, somehow, they all seem to lead back to Thor.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you very much to [ravenbringslight](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ravenbringslight/pseuds/ravenbringslight) for the support (always, literally always, and) during the conception part of this, and to the sharp eyes and minds of [writernotwaiting](https://archiveofourown.org/users/writernotwaiting/pseuds/writernotwaiting) and [sexualthorientation](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sexyscholar/pseuds/sexualthorientation) for the wonderful beta reads and edits. I can't imagine anyone reading this isn't familar with these amazing writers, but if you somehow aren't, please treat yourself.

 

>   ** _And I said to him that I had made a vow in my turn, that I would never marry a man who knew the meaning of fear.”_**
> 
> **_—The Poetic Edda, translated by Jackson Crawford_ **

* * *

 

 **** **Prologue**  
****  
****  
There has always been a Watcher.  
  
His memory is as long as his gaze is far-reaching. Though he sees all the many stars of the wide, aged universe in its many births, his feet stand in one place, and that place has been, in most iterations of the universe, at the Observatory of the Bifröst at the edge of Asgard.  
  
There Heimdall Gatekeeper stands sentinel and there he holds fast to Hofung, which is both key to opening the Bifröst’s glory and also a sword, sharp of blade and quenched well in the blood of Asgard’s enemies.

By the time the war for the Infinity Stones had come to the exiled people of Asgard, Heimdall the the Watchman had watched the burning of the golden Realm Eternal.  
  
Yet it had burned before during his Watch.

It had frozen, too, and it had imploded and exploded. It had been battered to pieces by stars and comets and meteors, been swallowed up by black holes and by the gaping jaws of the Wolf.

It had even been unwritten by the Norns themselves as they tugged and unraveled the fabric that knitted together Being itself.  
  
As Thanos had donned the Gauntlet and begun to search the many galaxies for the Gems of Power, Heimdall had done his duty to the Allfathers and Allmothers of the Golden Realm. He had shepherded the people of Asgard to the mountain keep and shared his Sight with Thor, helping the crown prince and his brother thwart the Death Goddess herself.

He’d witnessed, with great pride, Thor’s reluctant acceptance of his kingship and Loki’s shedding of many layers of artifice when all of Asgard was at risk.  
  
And then, at the end of this chapter of Heimdall’s long, long life, he reached for Hofung and his strong hand felt right and good upon the hilt of the sword-key. Golden eyes fixed with steady resolve upon his new king and he called upon the old, dark magic of the Allfathers one last time with his tired, prone body.

With all the surging power of the Bifröst he sent Banner’s beast home to his sweet, green earth to alert Midgard that Thanos was coming.  
  
And then there was pain, Heimdall’s body broken, his _sál_ torn from his muscle, bone, and blood.  
  
There was darkness then and nothing to See, but the shrill cry of ravens beckoned Heimdall. His _hugr_ , the mind and heart of him that had always been and would be again the Watcher, followed. 

 

* * *

  
Loki stands facing the Titan, somehow borne upright by a millenium of training and artfully crafted haughtiness. Everything is surreal.  
  
Loki remembers his father chastising him for styling himself a god, and here is the tyrant that haunts Loki’s restless nights, the twisted, arcane creature who’d pulled Loki from the Void then warped him far beyond the jealous, broken waste he’d been _—_ and if Thanos doesn’t imagine himself a god, Loki can't fathom who in this universe does.

The strangeness of the scene is reinforced by the oddity of the conversation: Loki keeps hearing his own thoughts spoken aloud by others.  
  
Ebony Maw, Child of Thanos, echoes Loki’s own words from his appearance on Midgard, the speech itself a hollow imitation of Thanos’ “teachings”: To fold the truth upon itself so that subjugation meant freedom and death became salvation.

Thanos himself speaks of fear “turning the legs to jelly” while Loki's unsure how his own knees haven’t buckled at the sight of the man who left vicious scars on his skin (and far worse in his mind) holding Thor limp as a ragdoll in one brutal fist.  
  
When Thanos’ vainglorious prattling reaches the absurd even to Loki’s terrified mind, his brother, head askew in the Titan’s vise grip, manages a flippant, “You talk too much.”

It bolsters Loki’s courage for the bravado he needs to distract Thanos, to hold his attention for a few more precious moments.  
  
To lie his very best.

“The Tesseract,” Thanos demands, “Or your brother’s head? I assume you have a preference?"

Loki pretends Thanos’ voice doesn’t bring up bile to sting the back of his throat.  
  
“Oh, I do,” Loki answers smoothly and with conviction. And then he lets his anger free into his shout: “Kill away!”  
  
Tears glass over Loki’s eyes, but he passes it off as his infamous rage against his brother. He watches carefully at the press of power and force against Thor’s skull, gauging his brother’s reaction carefully before he yells, _“All right, stop!”_

Thor gains his breath, still in Thanos’ unyielding clutch and huffs, “We don’t have the Tesseract. It was destroyed on Asgard.”

Loki looks to the floor, his shame a cold leaden addition to the sickness flooding his guts. He twists his hands in the Motion of Summoning and the Tesseract appears.

Thanos smirks and Loki feels faint for a moment, but then there's unhinged glee at Thor’s predictable response.  
  
“You really are...the worst brother.”

Loki approaches Thanos with the Tesseract, his eyes fixed on Thor. The Tesseract colors everything an uncanny blue. Blue like his brother’s eyes—eye. The glaring, penetrating blue that had stung Loki’s eyes when stepping from his darkened room out into an overly bright summer day on Asgard.  
  
With that image behind his eyes, Loki holds out the encased Stone to the Titan, and says with solemn firmness to Thor, “I assure you, Brother, the sun will shine on us again.”

Thanos tells Loki, “Your optimism is misplaced, Asgardian.”

And oh, how the contrarian in him delights in answering, “Well, for one thing, I’m not Asgardian.”

Loki savors the dramatic pause. “And for another, we have the Hulk.”

Then he dives toward Thor, dropping the Tesseract as if it’s nothing—it isn’t now; it’s already lost. Loki rolls Thor to safety as the Hulk charges Thanos, punching relentlessly but for such a short time Loki’s stunned. The metallic roar of Thanos’ armored fists clangs in Loki’s ears as they collide with the Hulk’s body.

In no time at all, the Titan has the Hulk held aloft then throws him to the floor with a sickeningly loud thud. Loki’s frozen, watching as if from far away as Thor attacks now and Thanos beats him back like a flimsy nothing.

Shocked and helpless, Loki watches Ebony Maw send broken bits of the ship to hem in Thor with effortless magic. In effect it’s a cage, resembling a grotesquerie of a throne.  
  
Before anyone can act, Heimdall has begun to call on his sword, murmuring a spell or prayer (Loki can’t hear) and the colors of the Bifröst explode, then the Hulk is hurtling through space.  
  
Thanos is livid, and as he growls his threat, Loki sees Thor share a fraught look with Heimdall before the Titan spears Heimdall as if it’s nothing, as if he weren’t the Gatekeeper and an Elder of Asgard.  
  
Loki feels Thor’s anguished cry in his chest, in his own lungs; hears Thor swear death to Thanos and sends a silent prayer of his own that the Titan will die by Thor’s hand.  
  
Maw calls forth a gag from more debris and here is another mockery. Now Thor is muzzled as Loki had been on Midgard.     
  
The obsequious creature Maw kneels and presents the Tesseract to Thanos, who crushes the casement, revealing the Stone. It looks so small as he drops it into the gauntlet.

And now Thanos mentions that mortal realm, which holds two Stones. So Loki makes a feeble stratagem, offering himself up as a guide to Midgard, swallowing back his history with Thanos and gambling as if this were the Grandmaster instead. He knows the attempt will fail, and failure is the word on Thanos’ ugly lips.

Loki sees panic then in Thor’s one eye, and knows then that death is for him now, but not for them both.  
  
Somehow, Loki’s still convinced, childlike, that his brother is immortal. But Loki himself has faked and cheated death far too many times and now it’s here. In this moment, Loki chooses how to meet it. He conjures a knife as he approaches Thanos because for one mad moment he’s thinking of Valhalla, of dying in righteous battle with weapon in hand.

Pride of birth, pride of his adopted family and desperate, fierce love for Thor drive Loki as he approaches the Titan.  
  
He takes comfort in the cool steel concealed at his wrist as he begins the vow.  
  
“Almighty Thanos,” he begins, defiant but regal, “I, Loki, Prince of Asgard,” and he can’t help but lock eyes upon his brother and take the name “Odinson,” and the look is weighty, one of the last words he will say to Thor is to a reaffirm his family name. He’s overcome for a moment and looks down to gather himself for what he must do.  
  
He continues, “The rightful King of Jotunheim, God of Mischief, do hereby pledge to you my undying fidelity.” And fleetingly, he looks once more upon that face, familiar as his own, half obscured now with metal cage and stolen eye but so beloved still.

Loki fixes it in his memory and thrusts his knife up toward Thanos, only to find his arm suspended in a potent shield of magic.

Then he’s in the air, dangling and feeling horribly small. His blade clatters to the floor as his hands reflexively grab at Thanos’ hands. He’s dizzy and muddled, his pulse a terrible pressure in his eyes and ears. But pride still fuels him for a last promise. He sucks in air enough through his constricted windpipe to spit out a last fervent oath at the crazed zealot, “You will _never be a god_.”  
  
He’s beyond pain, delirious, and the last thing he hears is his brother, his Thor, screaming for him, muffled but recognizably denying this death.

That “ _No!”_ carries Loki. It’s a warrior's cry and a mourner's wail.

It means, “I love you.” It means,  _B_ _rother don’t go._

But Loki is gone.

Thor is freed now and he crawls, bleeding, to his brother. Thor’s blood falls freely from his lips onto Loki’s very heart in a bloody kiss as he holds his brother’s far too real corpse in a final embrace.

 

* * *

  
As the broken Statesman shatters and Thor is tossed from the ship into the shock of cold darkness, no one is there to see the numinous moment when Loki’s _sál_ goes to the stars, when his  _hamr,_ his shape, changes from a heavy dead weight to a glimmering dance of gold and green that moves upward and outward, reaching.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Gratitude and hugs to [rosatremaine](https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosatremaine/pseuds/rosatremaine) and [sexualthorientation](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sexyscholar/pseuds/sexualthorientation) for beta reading and edits. xx

Awareness coalesces slowly. Fragments of memory and impression loosely align along an axis of time, all out of order at first.   
  
_ In an over-bright cell, he screams until his voice tears raw and soundless from his throat, his hands tensed into claws as if this heartbreak could be pulled from him. _

_ Raucous and tawdry, this world is a lurid blur. He accepts drinks, floats through conversations, and allows graceless touches. He seduces and lies and invests a thousand bright, false smiles in a capricious Elder of the Universe. _

_ Confusion and betrayal rush through him with the spell. It feels like reverse alchemy; the gilded life he knew falls away and the lie of it hits him heavy as lead. This cold blue light is the truth of him, monstrous and unlivable. _

_ He’s a child wiping tears on a silken nightgown as he’s carried away from someone he loves. The beloved is small and red-faced from bawling but a soft light from behind paints a corona of golden hair around the sweet, puckered face.  _ __  
_  
_ __ On a high tower on an alien world, he smiles briefly through tears and stabs a vicious little blade through a seam in armor he knows as well as the familiar one wearing it. 

_ Eyes fixed with yearning adoration upon a greying man, small hands squirming behind his back, he listens with the golden boy to stories of a great war. As they walk away together, he has eyes only for the other boy who is joyfully practicing at war. _

The events shine like looking glasses, and a million moments become shapes, become scales, become a serpent. It’s in endless motion, coiling upon and around itself, between and through itself, but always looping back to find its tail. 

“An infinite, mirrored snake,” thinks some awareness, “That seems fitting.”   
  
“Aye,” the serpent thinks in return.   
  
A sense of panic ripples along its body, shattering the surface.   
  
“Be at ease,” the wyrm answers, “You are Loki.  _ Fjölnir:  _ One Who is Many. Friggajarson. Laufeyson. Loki Lie-Smith, Loki of —”   
  
“I begin to know myself now,” says Loki of Asgard, of Jotunheim. “I am Loki Odinson, God of Mischief.” The scales reflect eyes green and shining and keen, lips curved into a knowing smile.

Loki remembers his fall now, and his enemy’s face. But he remembers it two ways—

One mind feels the rush of anger filling him with the furor of his ancestors. He is aware of the wars of his mothers and fathers back to the times of the slaying of Ymir, that death which carved out the world in the beginning, and Loki knows that beautiful death was in his hands at the time of his dying.

But also his  _ hugr _ hears the clatter of a fallen blade on the steel floor, the panic of someone’s screaming. He feels desperate terror chilling his belly. He knows all the fear of his life and sees that it had been a small life—always hungering, coveting, lacking. He recalls ceaseless weeping, loathing himself and all else, and forever hiding and lying. Never worthy.

He pushes both the sickening fear and the battle-glory aside to focus, and it is only with great strength of will that he summons anything at all. 

But his determination seems to remain, even here. He calls on his purpose. He knows he has a reason, something beyond himself. He knows his names and titles, his parentage—even accepts it late though it may be—but there is something  _ more _ .

An impression comes of bright eyes, blue as the flowers dotting Asgard’s river valleys, and the scales on the beast shine like summer with the image of forget-me-nots. Then Loki can see them truly, and the sun on them is so familiar, the eyes are that color but still it’s just out of reach…     
  
Then the sky grows dark and thick laden clouds gather, rain a sudden assault on the delicate petals and Loki is bewildered for a moment until a sharp forking branch of light pierces through the clouds and he remembers  _ everything. _

He is bodiless, lifeless, probably outside time and space but still he is Loki, Brother of Thor and he has ridden with him on the storm. 

He is _seiðmaðr,_ son of Frigga, he is the son of Odin Grim and Wise and he is magic-wielder even here.

He is Loki who saved Asgard by bringing its doom by fire and he is Loki who survived death at birth on the ice.

But like the circling form of his  _ fylgja,  _ the truth of him always comes home to the same place. He is the brother of Thor and his purpose lies there. 

He is Loki Odinson and a plan is forming.

“I am power,” he tells the serpent. “I am Loki of Ice and Flame and now I will be a shaping God, a naming God.” 

At this, a glimmer of green dances across the surface of the great snake. Bound to him and ever reflecting him, it is Loki’s  _ fylgja  _ and it knows its duty. Loki died both proud with blade in hand and shaking with fear in his  _ sàl _ in the shining, looping coils his fate must send him to Valhalla or to Hel. Sometimes, albeit rarely, the tellings of the Norns are unclear and the servant must wait to deliver the  _ sàl _ to the next realm. This one has waited for the nature of Loki Trickster to be decided before.

Yet the  _ fylgja _ , like all true things, knows the power of names. The snake is cunning and canny like Loki Silvertongue, for it has been with him and of him for many lives.  But this idea is new and that means flux and retelling. Here in the between-worlds the paths do not change.

But Loki does speak power, “I Name you,  _ fylgja, _ and I call you by the word Jǫrmungandr, the Monster of Realms and I have laid upon you title and kenning and thus my claim on you and command of you.” 

The serpent thrashes and knots its coils and Loki is separate now, his  _ hamr _ a green-gold suggestion on the glassy skin of the creature.

_ Purpose _ , Loki thinks, and he guides Jǫrmungandr onward to the Gates.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For ‘fylgja’ and ‘sàl,’ here's that link again to the parts of the self/soul in Old Norse thought: https://norse-mythology.org/concepts/the-parts-of-the-self
> 
> A note about names, titles, and kennings: These are significant in Old Norse and Icelandic (and probably other Scandinavian cultures but I haven’t read broadly) poetry. A kenning is a figurative, descriptive way to refer to a subject—like calling Odin ‘One-Eye’ or ‘The Hanged One.’ 
> 
> The kennings for Loki are mostly familiar from the MCU or myth, but I did steal ‘Fjölnir’ from Odin. In myth those sneaky bastards have a LOT in common:D
> 
> I don’t know if the Old Norse used names like this in ritual practice, but they’re significant to neopagans and practitioners of many kinds of modern magic. I’ve often heard the phrase “naming is taming,” and I believe Neil Gaiman used it in his ‘Norse Mythology’ but don’t quote me on that. But see also Voldemort;)
> 
> Jǫrmungandr, or the World Serpent or Midgard Serpent, is actually Loki’s ~~omg adorable snek bby~~ giant serpent offspring in myth, with Angrboða. I AM OBSESSED. With both of them. All the Loki babiessss.
> 
> 'Seiðmaðr' literally means “magic master.” Think sorcerer or male-coded witch.
> 
> Edited to add:
> 
> Ymir was the giant who was the very first being in Norse mythology. They were intersex, or most often called in myth retellings, ‘hermaphroditic’. (Archaic; please do not use.) They were slain by their grandsons Odin, Vili, and Ve, and all of the realms were made from parts of their body.
> 
> The Norns (or correctly pluralized 'Nornir') can be seen as cognates to the Greek Fates. There are many who live on all of the realms but three Norns are chief among them and it's these that are usually meant when one sees the term 'Norns'. These are called Urðr (That-Which-Is, or the past); Verdanði (That-Which-Is-Becoming, or the present); and Skuld (That-Which-Should/Could/Ought-to-Be, or the future) and are, at least in reconstructed paganism, seen as having a somewhat similar role as the Fates in steering the course of our lives. Link with more about the Norns: http://www.northernpaganism.org/shrines/norns/about.html
> 
> And here’s a video by Dr. Crawford with a linguistic bent on the names of the three chief Norns: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vcaG19-leJA


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's not even Monday! I was anxious to get this chapter live so I can get moving on my story for the [Thorki Big Bang](https://thorkibigbang.tumblr.com/):D Thanks to Raven for the beta reading and Rosa for general handholding and moral support. ❤
> 
>  [Raven @ Ao3](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ravenbringslight/pseuds/ravenbringslight)  
> [Raven @ Tumblr](http://raven-brings-light.tumblr.com)
> 
>   [Rosa @ A03](https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosatremaine/pseuds/rosatremaine)  
> [Rosa @ Tumblr](http://fictions-stranger.tumblr.com)
> 
> Oh, I edited the end notes on the previous chapter. I forgot to include information about Ymir, the first being, and the Norns. Oops. Ymir is so fascinating. I very much encourage further reading and Neil Gaiman's retelling of this creation myth is one of my favorite stories in his 'Norse Mythology.'
> 
> As always, you can [follow me on Tumblr for my chaotic antics.](http://darklittlestories.tumblr.com)

The gate to  Glaðsheimr shocks Loki more with its physical, solid presence than with its size. He remembers tales of Valhalla itself, the massive Golden Hall, from his lessons and he’d expected this excess of sheer volume. Eight hundred warriors could march shoulder to shoulder through each of more than five hundred towering doors. 

Shape and scale are rather more approachable here in some ways but quite grandiose in others.    
  
Gathering his will, he calls  Jǫrmungandr to a halt before the gate. They will not enter, at least not before seeking the counsel of one he’s certain will be within.

It’s strange and disconcerting after traveling between worlds in the odd dimensions of the paths of  Yggdrasill to sense real weight and form here.  Loki feels aware of some substantive self again, though it isn’t rightly a body and he can see through the loosely gathered whorls that merely suggest the shape of him. They may be standing upon or within  Glaðsheimr itself, the realm housing Valhalla. (Loki’s  _ hugr _ wants to veer off into conjecture and possibility of how location might work in a world such as this but he reigns it in. He has work to do — Purpose, always purpose.) 

  
He reaches to calm his serpent, finding he can stroke the coiling body which fits, in this realm, into finite space. The scaled surface soothes him, cool and sleek, and he moves his mind and  _ hamr _ in synchrony until he reaches the place from which he can cast out chants, cantrips, and invocations. With a soft, melancholy smile, and  _ seiðr _ eddying in subtle curls, he sends out a summoning spell.

* * *

The shieldmaiden is a blur of deadly action, sword slicing through the piercing-bright summer day like a spinning razor. Her weapon is so quick her kills hit the ground before the blood begins to flow. The same skill stops her a centimeter short of an Einheri’s throat when a vision slams into her mind. 

It’s so powerful and clear that Frigga is nearly blind to the battle before her.

Her sword gives a dull thud as she drops it on a pile of bodies that will live again at feasting time and she sets off racing toward the gate.

She’s seen Loki and she’s sobbing as she runs. 

He stands outside the entrance to Valhalla but isn’t touching the tall, gleaming gate. 

His hands are extended in the supine gesture of invoking, and he is not whole and solid but a creature of woven patterns of golden light. She’s never seen anything like this. His eyes are just ever-renewing tears of fractal emerald lights that pour outward and then drift through the gate. The color flows toward her, unwinding and unfolding and beckoning her.

She doesn’t need this, nor the call of  _ seiðr, _ to pull her toward Loki. She would have known her child was near the moment this strange  _ hamr _ came near this realm.

She’s been waiting, of course. 

When the sun falls low each eve over this bright, bloody world and the warriors have drunk themselves to sleep on the mead the  _ skálds _ sing of, Frigga weaves. By the light of moon and stars and candle flame, her strong fine fingers coax clouds and prayers into silken tapestries. In their warp and weft she can see much of destiny. 

She has a new cloak waiting, woven of these things for her fallen child: 

secrets whispered during trysts,  
lies half-believed from lips with half smiles,  
the laughter of children who are neither boys nor girls,  
warmth tasted on the tongues of freshly molted snakes,  
the sharp attention of a magpie’s eyes on a glinting treasure,  
and the sound of footfalls no one hears as thieves dash from their crimes in the dark.

But this surprises her, to see him waiting outside Valhalla instead of within it, and his _fylgja_ at his side like a huge tamed dragon. The whole of her _sál_ breaks into a smile at this, for of course he’s found a way to surprise her. He is Loki.

She steels herself to speak with him and her smile frays a bit at the edges, hoping he can cope with all she has to tell him. 

* * *

It’s been too long since Thor last slept. He can manage longer than his mortal companions without rest, but he’s feeling the toll of too many wakeful nights.

He sees the shadows deepen beneath the eyes and cheeks of his friends-in-arms, watches as hair grows wilder while they fight and plan and research and weeks threaten to become months. Even Tony has given up his fastidious grooming, and his wiry beard is streaked with grey.   
  
They’re back on Midgard, regrouping in one of Tony’s properties. Stark slumps into the room, Slayer t-shirt baggy on his thinning frame. He’s clutching a bottle in a tight fist and he winces as he sits down next to Thor.

“Here, Ziggy Stardust,” he offers the bottle to Thor after taking a hearty pull himself. “You look as bad as I do and I’ve cancelled mirrors. I…” Tony sobs a laugh. They’re all just this side of completely broken. He gestures to his chest. “I have cancelled fucking mirrors.”

Thor doesn’t bother trying to parse the nickname beyond acknowledging subconsciously that it’s a good sign that at least Stark is still using perplexing mortal references to tease him. He just drinks. Deeply. It burns and he’s glad of it. 

Later, drink having finally softened the bite of this new reality, Thor is in his room. It’s a balm to have a silent place to himself. 

Life these days is like grit in the eye, ashes in the mouth.

But the whiskey has blurred things enough that exhaustion can draw him down into sleep with merciful speed. He falls under murmuring the same prayer he has every moment he can gather the fortitude to speak it:  
  
Loki, I bid you take your place   
In the halls of Valhalla   
Where the brave shall live forever.   
Nor shall we mourn but rejoice   
For those that have died the glorious death.

_ Six figures stand round his bed, silent and almost transparent, and he cannot quite make them out at first. As soon as he recognizes them, they change.  _

_ First they are Father, Heimdall, Sif, Volstagg, Fandral, and Hogun. Then it’s Fury, Steve, Stark, Natasha, Barton, and Banner. Then Coulson, Jane, Darcy, the Valkyrie, Korg, and Miek. They’re all just impressions, and they interchange. It’s quite peaceful, and Thor feels they are there to support and to comfort him. _ __  
_  
_ __ Now he is back in the Norn pool, but the scrying visions are of rebirth and beauty now. The worst is behind him. He wears a simple crown. Raw stone crystals and fulgurites are woven with forget-me-nots into a circlet of ash and his hair has grown long enough to braid.

_ Now he’s accepting a cup from a familiar pair of pale hands. It’s full of honey-sweet mead and he drinks and drinks and it never empties. He could drink from this cup for a month and not drain it of mead. _

It’s on this comforting thought that the odd, tranquil dreams leave him to rest undisturbed. When Thor wakes he feels invigorated, and he tends to his companions as they greet the morning looking as haunted as they have every other day since the universe was torn in half. 

Thor doesn’t remember the dreams, but he knows that sleep feels makes him feel more whole than he has a right to.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Settle in for some very ADHD notes probably. Again, hotlinks are breaking and I give up. Sorry for the inconvenience, but it's killing my brain.
> 
> AH! So, the bit about Frigga weaving... I have squee. First, I found the idea of her weaving the clouds (I think as in creating them, not using them as wool the way I did here, but I’m not sure) a long time ago on neopagan sites for modern witches, heathens, etc. Frigg is a known as a ‘völva’ or seeress, sorceress, witch. I don’t know if there are primary sources backing up her weaving the clouds, but I love it so much I decided to use it and see if it’s in the Eddas or Sagas or anywhere else later. 
> 
> So then as I was writing I googled ‘seiðr’ to paste the letter ð because I can never remember the html for ð and I found this groovy information at Norse-Mythology.org: “Seidr (pronounced “SAY-der;” Old Norse seiðr, “cord, string, snare”) is a form of pre-Christian Norse magic and shamanism concerned with discerning and altering the course of destiny by re-weaving part of destiny's web.”  
> Link: https://norse-mythology.org/concepts/seidr
> 
> How fucking cool is it that the whole ass WORD FOR MAGIC IMPLIES WEAVING?  
> (The pronunciation they suggest isn’t right, though. The letter ð sounds like the “th” in ‘they’.)
> 
> So I looked up “Frigg weaving” (Frigga is the anglicized version of the Norse goddess Frigg) and started getting lost in a rabbit hole of mythology and etymology because there’s a lot of conjecture and not enough solid info because Frigg and-or Freyja come from a very old Germanic goddess. 
> 
> But I did find this lovely etching at Wiki Commons from an old book on Norse mythology, so some scholars must dig the “Frigg weaves the clouds” myth. https://darklittlestories.tumblr.com/post/174628879919/frigg-spinning-the-clouds-by-john-charles-dollman
> 
> Skálds were the official court poets employed by Scandinavian leaders during the Viking age.
> 
> The Einherjar (Sort of between ain-HAIR-ee-ahr and ain-HAIR-yahr) “once-fighters” (singular: einheri) are the warriors who live in Valhalla after dying in battle and being chosen by the Valkyrjur. They train in battle each day and those who are slain rise again. At Ragnarök they’ll fight with Oðin.  
> I hunted down the singular form at Vikings of Bjornstad: http://www.vikingsofbjornstad.com/Old_Norse_Dictionary_E2N.shtm
> 
> Glaðsheimr is where Valhalla is located. It means “bright home.” In Viking mythology it’s not one of the nine worlds; it’s in Asgard. I’ve seen it called the hall of Odin a lot in various places, too. For this story, I’m implying that it’s a separate realm because MCU reasons.

**Author's Note:**

> From here on out, I’ll be posting notes that are relevant to the story in the beginning notes and the deep dive mythology (& comic canon) notes in the end notes here so they’re skippable. I hope to keep writing so that this info is self-evident in context but I’m learning a fuckton here and I’m WAY too geeked out not to share. <3 So if you wanna get nerdy with me, that’ll be down here.
> 
> Regarding spelling and usage, when I'm choosing words and spellings that are canon-typical--like Midgard, Asgardian, Valhalla, etc. when they're used in the MCU I'll used the modern anglicized version. When they're not, like the afterlife stuff and mythology that the Marvel hasn't adapted (that I know of; I'm not very familiar with the comics so most of that will come from online) I'll use the Old Norse spellings and italicize them.
> 
> Xx, Story
> 
> \--------  
> To the Old Norse, what we now call the soul, or _sál_ , a word that appeared in Old Norse only after Christianity was introduced, wasn’t a singularity. Rather they believed four parts composed the self. The _hamr_ was the shape or skin, and it was believed that some could shift or change this, and the words for shapeshifter refer to this part of the self.  
>  The _hugr_ was the thoughts or the mind itself, the personality.
> 
> The third part was the _fylgja_. It’s going to appear in the next chapter. (And my apologies to any neopagans who practice based on heathenry, Asatru, Odinism, or other Norse traditions because I’ll be taking DRASTIC liberties.) The _fylgja_ is an animal-identified spirit that died with the body. During life the _fylgja_ was a sort of guardian or something similar to the popular notion of the “witch’s familiar.” _Fylgja_ literally means “to accompany.” One source related it to the “fetch” of Irish folklore, in the sense of a spiritual double of a physical being, but without the ominous notions of the fetch. According to my main source, only those with great spiritual attunement could “see” the _fylgja_.
> 
> The fourth part of the “self” was something translated best as “luck” but closer to what and English speaker would call fate, the _hamingja_. It’s a little puzzling that it’s considered part of the self because it’s only very loosely attached to the person and can even be removed in some circumstances, such as being “reincarnated” to one’s descendants.
> 
> My source for these ideas is mostly [The Self and its Parts.](https://norse-mythology.org/concepts/the-parts-of-the-self)
> 
> The identification of the _fylgja_ with the Irish fetch is from [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fylgja)
> 
> Regarding Jackson Crawford, the translator referenced above: He is EVERYTHING. I have spent so many hours bingeing on [his YouTube videos](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCXCxNFxw6iq-Mh4uIjYvufg) and crushing so damn hard on "Dr. Cowboy." He's a Professor of Scandinavian Studies at University of Colorado at Boulder. If you're a linguistics or languages nerd or just want to hear a brilliant, adorable dude speak Old Norse a lot and get salty about how wrong the show 'Vikings' is and throw shade at Nazis appropriating Viking shit, HE IS YOUR GUY.
> 
> I’m contradicting his and probably most scholars’ interpretations of Ragnarök. It’s not cyclical, at least in the way I’m depicting it with Heimdall. Dr. Crawford has a short video, [Is Ragnarök Cyclical?](https://youtu.be/kH51WW_nRkE) that explains what happens after Ragnarök, because though it isn't an unending cycle, there is an "after."


End file.
